This Sunday, May 26, the Rays and Suncoast Credit Union will partner for the launch of the 17th season of Reading with the Rays—Read Your Way to the Ballpark, an incentive-based reading program that encourages Pre-K to 12th grade students to avoid summer learning loss by reading for 24 hours during the summer months. To kick off the program, the Rays will host a Spanish reading event from 11-11:30 a.m. at Tropicana Field during which a Rays player will read several books to children and their families from the Hispanic Services Council and the Florida Institute for Community Studies.

"Each year, the enthusiasm of students participating in Reading with the Rays brings us joy," said Suncoast Credit Union Foundation Executive Director Kourtney Berry. “Through this program, we strive to create a lifelong love for reading, while ensuring students stay academically engaged throughout the summer.”

Libraries participating in Reading with the Rays track students’ progress and award prizes for reaching certain goals, including two free tickets to a Rays game. Reading with the Rays is made possible with the help of the Tampa Bay Times Newspaper in Education and public library systems in Pinellas, Hillsborough, Osceola, Citrus, Polk, Pasco, Hernando, Sarasota and Charlotte counties. Students can pick up their Reading with the Rays game card at a participating library, or they can download a game card at RaysBaseball.com/Reading.

Since the program’s inception in 2007, over 500,000 children across nine area counties have spent more than 3.16 million hours reading over the summer. For more information about the program, visit RaysBaseball.com/Reading.

About Suncoast Credit Union

Suncoast Credit Union is the largest credit union in the state of Florida, the 8th largest in the United States based on membership, and the 10th largest in the United States based on its $18.2 billion in assets. Chartered in 1934 as Hillsborough County Teachers Credit Union, Suncoast Credit Union currently operates 78 full-service branches and serves more than 1.2 million members across Florida. As a community credit union, anyone who lives, works, attends school, or worships in Suncoast Credit Union’s service area is eligible for membership. In 2021, Suncoast Credit Union’s field of membership was expanded to include public K-12 teachers, college educators, and educational support staff from all of Florida’s 67 counties. Suncoast is passionate about community support. Since its founding in 1990, the Suncoast Credit Union Foundation has raised and donated more than $44 million to organizations and initiatives that support the health, education, and emotional well-being of children in the communities that the credit union serves. For more information, visit suncoast.com or follow us on social media: Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram.